The man who can’t help
 So it’s no surprise Fred is on board The Sunday Post CHAS Appeal. Quietly and without fuss Fred has been doing his bit for Scotland’s existing children’s hospice, Rachel House, for years. And he’s excited at the prospect of getting involved with the new hospice at Loch Lomond.
Funnyman Fred was poached by John Rae, a former member of the CHAS fund-raising team, four years ago after he heard him give an after-dinner speech.
“One of the things that goes along with being on radio and TV is that you get inundated with requests to do something for charity,” said Fred, “and you have to turn a lot of them down.
“The big difference with CHAS was they said — ‘Come and see how we work before you make up your mind’. So my wife Aileen and I went to visit Rachel House.
“To be honest, I was apprehensive and wondered if I could hack it. Being in a hospice for terminally-ill children? You worry you won’t have the courage.
Where’s Ally?
“I’ve visited Quarriers Homes with Ally McCoist and he has a knack for being completely relaxed in the company of children who have come through all kinds of distress. They totally love him. Most people do. I’m the man who is constantly being asked the question, ‘Where’s Ally?’. They ask for his autograph and take mine out of sympathy.”
Is this self-deprecation an act? If so, it’s a good one.
Fred and Aileen MacAulay found their first visit to Rachel House in December 2000 to be one of the most uplifting experiences of their lives. “There was warmth, laughter, and a positive atmosphere that takes your breath away,” he said.
“I mix with a lot of people in the entertainment business who my wife doesn’t care for.
Flim-flam
“She’s not a lady to mince her words. Flim-flam is what she calls them.”
But the children at Rachel House and the staff who work with them were, Fred and Aileen discovered, a million miles away from anything remotely resembling flim-flam.
Since then Fred has been back many times. At Christmas he helped make a meal for teenagers at Rachel House and then entertained them with an hour-long stand-up gig.
“I’m broad-minded about what I let my own kids see when I take them to the Edinburgh Festival so I reckon all teenagers can take humour with a bit of a kick to it. We had great fun.”
Fred also entertains hundreds of CHAS people at the Volunteers Conference held in Tulliallan. And he donates cash to the CHAS coffers from various events he comperes.
Not such a reluctant do-gooder after all, Mr MacAulay.
Fred and Aileen met when he was studying to be an accountant at Dundee University. She was his squash partner’s wee sister and he fancied her something rotten. It’s their 19th wedding anniversary this month. They have three children — Kara (16) Jack (14) and Iain (12).
The MacAulays live in a big stone house in Thorntonhall, south of Glasgow, and the children go to Glasgow Academy. He loves ski-ing, hillwalking, fishing and playing golf with his children. And he’s a fan of St Johnstone.
At 46, the former grey-suited accountant who has more than a quarter of a million people listening to him five mornings a week, looks fit, healthy and has the clear-eyed look and pleasant smile of a man content with his life.
Is he?
“I had a 10-year plan — and most of it has worked out,” he admitted. “I got away from accountancy into comedy and entertaining. I did the Hogmanay Show live with Carol Smillie. The telly stuff — Have I Got News For You, McCoist And MacAulay and Life According To Fred — makes your face known, but what I love best are gigs on stage.
“My next 10-year plan, when the house is paid, all the repairs done and the kids educated, is to take a sabbatical for a year, hit the road and do comedy festivals in Australia and America.
“Stand-up comedy keeps your skills sharp.”
Humour
Fred’s humour is based on close observation of current events, picking holes in people’s foibles and taking the mickey mercilessly out of the audience.
At a Glasgow show recently he accused one woman sitting near the front of being old and incontinent, and needing a handy exit. She took it in good part.
No-one escapes. “It’s not true that Aberdonians are tight-fisted,” he said, “but I gather American Express are considering launching a beige card in Aberdeen for purchases up to the value of £4.99.”
Fred was born in Perth and educated at Perth Academy. He says his humour dates back to his great-great-grandfather who was a storyteller in Harris.
His dad, also called Fred, was a policeman who died recently, aged 72, from an asbestos-related illness he picked up as a young man in his 20s. He was a funny man too.
“Losing him was one of the toughest things our family has had to face,” he said. “But we all pulled together and it’s then you realise the strength of family life.
“Our house was full of laughter. My brother Duncan is as funny as I am (but he’ll see that as a criticism).”
He had a happy childhood “skiting” around Perthshire on his bike and hitch-hiking to Glenshee with his old wooden skis.
Cheeky wee devil
“I was a cheeky wee devil. A smart-ass always ad-libbing with my pals, making fun of teachers — learning how far you can go. That works with audiences too. You learn to read body language and people’s eyes.”
All his comedy material comes, he says “from my warped head”.
Fred’s only regret is that he’s seen as being “the nice man of Scottish comedy”. A tag that makes him pull a face.
He concedes that there’s not been enough bad stuff in his past to make him tortured.
I mean, what kind of man are you if you give up the comforts of your double bed in your comfy home to walk the Great Wall of China to raise money for cancer patients at Glasgow’s Prince and Princess of Wales Hospice?
Fred did that two years ago, surviving on three hours sleep a night. He raised £10,000, though.
And he’s determined to give the same sort of commitment to CHAS — raising money, entertaining the troops, visiting the kids. Spreading sunshine, spreading laughter. Spreading a wee bit of (sorry Fred) niceness and goodness.
 Fred starts a round-Scotland (and a bit of Ireland) tour in Orkney on Tuesday. Nineteen venues later he ends up in Inverness on June 10. |
You can e-mail us at:
hospice@sundaypost.com
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